Various Specific Questions

[Quake2Slayer]

Hey. There seems to always be some questions about Diablo that pop up as i play, and rarely i can not find the answers even after searching for hours. Just thought i'd keep a thread up instead of creating new ones.

Although i have forgot a lot of them, here are a couple. I'll probably end up bumping this when i remember the rest.

-How is spell damage calculated from staff charges? Does the level of the spell in question affect the staff spell? ex. if my char has a level 3 firebolt, what would happen when i use a staff of firebolt charge? Does class and clvl still affect staff spell damage like with normal spells?

-Anyone have experience with auto-clickers? I'm trying to find the lowest possible click rate that still causes a warrior to swing as fast as possible. (my job messes my hands up proper, otherwise i'd just do it the old school way)

-Is there an active Diablo IRC chat (LL related or otherwise)? Does anyone still pop into battle.net servers or is it mostly tcp/ip?

That is all for now. Thanks in advance.

EDIT : Just remembered a couple more.

-If there are a bunch of items dropped on tiles surrounding an enemy, is there any way an item will not drop from said enemy? Ex : if you were to slay every skele in the doorway of the chamber of bone and items are dropping far away because there is not enough space, will it ever get to the point where they spawn out of reach? (or fail to drop)

-Does cracking barrels lower item durability?

[LennyLen]

Hey. There seems to always be some questions about Diablo that pop up as i play, and rarely i can not find the answers even after searching for hours. Just thought i'd keep a thread up instead of creating new ones.

Although i have forgot a lot of them, here are a couple. I'll probably end up bumping this when i remember the rest.

[quote='Quake2Slayer' pid='211481' dateline='1433219683']-How is spell damage calculated from staff charges? Does the level of the spell in question affect the staff spell? ex. if my char has a level 3 firebolt, what would happen when i use a staff of firebolt charge? Does class and clvl still affect staff spell damage like with normal spells?

Damage is calculated the same for spells cast from staves and scrolls as it is if cast from your spell book. The slvl of the staff/scroll will be the same as whatever level you know the spell at, or 1 if you don't know it. Due to a bug however, if you have a known spell hot-keyed while you cast from a staff or scroll, it will use that spell's slvl instead of the correct one.

-If there are a bunch of items dropped on tiles surrounding an enemy, is there any way an item will not drop from said enemy? Ex : if you were to slay every skele in the doorway of the chamber of bone and items are dropping far away because there is not enough space, will it ever get to the point where they spawn out of reach? (or fail to drop)

If there is insufficient space for the item to drop around the enemy, then it will not drop. There is also a limit of 256 items per floor, and once this is reached, no more items will drop.

-Does cracking barrels lower item durability?

Good question. I'm pretty sure the answer is yes.

[Quake2Slayer]

Thanks for the quick response. I also have a feeling that barrels count as far as weapon durability. I read a post about it many years ago.

Recently i have been attempting some warrior ironman games. I know this is asked a lot, but does anyone have general tips that may not be obvious to a player used to 'normal' play?

I read that you should only put enough points into strength to be able to stun monsters in hell. Is this dependent on damage, or does a certain amount of strength start stunning monsters?

Also, are axes anywhere near viable for somebody who is trying to run through the game without returning to town? I love axes but i really get nailed by ranged monsters without a shield.

[Nystul]

Thanks for the quick response. I also have a feeling that barrels count as far as weapon durability. I read a post about it many years ago.

Recently i have been attempting some warrior ironman games. I know this is asked a lot, but does anyone have general tips that may not be obvious to a player used to 'normal' play?

I read that you should only put enough points into strength to be able to stun monsters in hell. Is this dependent on damage, or does a certain amount of strength start stunning monsters?

Also, are axes anywhere near viable for somebody who is trying to run through the game without returning to town? I love axes but i really get nailed by ranged monsters without a shield.

To stun an enemy, your damage needs to be at least 3 points higher than the monster's level. Not counting bosses, the highest monster level on normal difficulty is 30, for all advocates, blood knights, and soulburners. So you need 33 damage to stun them.

For warrior, it is usually good to push the dexterity stat to its natural max of 60 fairly early. This helps a lot with chance to hit and shield blocking percentages. Sometimes they also bump magic to 17 if a staff of healing is found. By that point, getting your minimum damage up to 33 is no easy task. So most of the remaining points are probably going into strength rather than vitality.

Axes have a few problems. But mostly, the shield is just so valuable. I think weapon/shield combo is almost always superior.

[Belix]

Recently i have been attempting some warrior ironman games. I know this is asked a lot, but does anyone have general tips that may not be obvious to a player used to 'normal' play?

I'll try to offer some, but I'll probably be repeating points you've read elsewhere.

-Resist IDing stuff as long as you can unless you've found a unique you know is good. IDing stuff early only helps you early; being able to ID more items later when the game gets hardest deeper in the Caves and Hell when much better stuff begins dropping can offer a huge boost to your late game chances. Plus, you can potentially save a huge stack of ID scrolls for later if you chance across a Glimmering Shrine.

-Many normal Warriors overlook bows, but in Ironman they can be invaluable, especially if you're a solo Warrior. If you have an accuracy jewel/bow or can keep enemies at mid-range, he can wield bows nearly as effective as the Rogue, and you probably maxed Dexterity early on anyway. Bows can save you a lot of health when right, but remember you can't block while you have your bow out, so don't let anything with a melee attack get near you. With bow in hand you can pick off Familiars from a safe distance, slay retreating Gargoyles before they can regenerate, and snipe off Mages and Succubi in Hell. Succubus, typically a headache for Warriors, become very easy to deal with if you can use proper angles (experiment a bit) to shoot them around the edge of walls and obstacles, while their own attacks are blocked. Use the Corpse, Luke!

-Always be paranoid about rooms where there are multiple paths/doors, especially in the Caves. Unlike normal games, a couple monsters going around and coming up on your flank or back in IM can be quite fatal, given how under-equipped we tend to be.

-Some uniques you find may be much more useful in Ironman. I beat Normal IM once using The Bonesaw. The extra damage made it a lot easier to stun, especially when paired with the +% To Hit jewel I had. Likewise, I normally shun Gotterdamerung due to the darkness and zero resists, but it is arguably one of the unique best items an Ironman Warrior can find.

-If you find yourself completely overwhelmed by a pack of melee attackers and there's no escape, back yourself into a corner where only 2 or 3 can reach you to maximize your chance of survival. It's up to your gear, remaining potions, and the game's dice rolls to see what hit, missed or got blocked, but you may still have a chance. Never surrender!

I read that you should only put enough points into strength to be able to stun monsters in hell. Is this dependent on damage, or does a certain amount of strength start stunning monsters?

For simplicity's sake, I always max Dexterity first (live by the shield, die by the shield), then put the rest into Strength. If you can find even a plain Bastard Sword, this approach should be sufficient for achieving consistent stuns.

Also, are axes anywhere near viable for somebody who is trying to run through the game without returning to town? I love axes but i really get nailed by ranged monsters without a shield.

Strictly speaking my advice would be to avoid Axes entirely. I've played normal games with them, and even there the combined loss of blocking and having less AC makes the damage bonus hardly worth it. In IM where your chief concern is staying alive, their usefulness is dubious at best.

However, in levels where there is nothing to block (e.g. all spell users with no melee attacks), lacking a weapon fast enough to stunlock opponents an Axe should give you a better chance at killing Mages outright before they attempt to Teleport away, especially with a critical hit (does double damage, the chance to score a critical is a percentage identical to your Warrior's level, e.g. Level 15 Warrior = 15% chance).

In one IM game I ended up using The Grizzly (2H Sword) in Hell out of desperation as I hadn't found any other good weapons. The high damage and knockback was somewhat viable against hell's Knights as long as I kited carefully. But even that felt like a losing battle, and you're not likely to find an Axe as good.

[nightstrike]

-Resist IDing stuff as long as you can unless you've found a unique you know is good. IDing stuff early only helps you early; being able to ID more items later when the game gets hardest deeper in the Caves and Hell when much better stuff begins dropping can offer a huge boost to your late game chances. Plus, you can potentially save a huge stack of ID scrolls for later if you chance across a Glimmering Shrine.

Does this really work? The traits of the item are determined at ID time, not at the time of creation of the item? Are you sure about this?

[Belix]

Does this really work? The traits of the item are determined at ID time, not at the time of creation of the item? Are you sure about this?

Apologies, I didn't mean to suggest that IDing the same item later makes it better. You're correct, traits are determined when the item is generated. I meant that it is better long-term to save ID scrolls to identify items you find later than waste them on the poor quality items you find early in the game (where you can make do with just about any gear anyway).

[nightstrike]

Oh, ok. That makes more sense. Thanks!

[AltheaLBL]

One of the most important aspect of ironman is how you scout/map out the level. Plan ahead. Take corners wide in the church/cats so you don't get surprise swarmed around corners. Know exactly how many tiles your line of sight goes out to, as your line of sight = radius of activating monsters. I like to think of not moving my character but moving my "light radius" around the map.

Avoid the middle of big rooms, hugging the walls will reduce the number of monsters you will activate.

This will also allow you to use the "wall slide" technique as a warrior, allowing you to take on a swarm of monsters 2v1 instead of getting surrounded or having to retreat to the door everytime.

Always leave yourself an escape route and be aware of your surroundings.. there's nothing worse than not knowing where to go when things go south and accidentally running into a new pack of monsters.

One thing i often do is keep a TP scroll on belt 8 and use it to quickly escape a bad situation (assuming you aren't playing lock in IM)

One last tip would be try to avoid using scrolls or spells of healing in combat, the cast time is slower than a potion and you might die during casting. If you're healing for a teammate, try to get on voice chat so they can tell you when to cast heal other, as the lag can sometimes lie to you about current HP.

That's all the tips off the top of my head today, good luck down there.